{"id":367,"date":"2019-04-04T11:47:15","date_gmt":"2019-04-04T11:47:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo-content.kaliumtheme.com\/bookstore\/?p=367"},"modified":"2019-04-04T11:47:15","modified_gmt":"2019-04-04T11:47:15","slug":"i-was-paid-12500-to-write-my-book-heres-why-im-revealing-that","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/i-was-paid-12500-to-write-my-book-heres-why-im-revealing-that\/","title":{"rendered":"I was paid $12,500 to write my book. Here&#039;s why I&#039;m revealing that"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"tonal__standfirst u-cf\">\n<div class=\"content__standfirst\" data-link-name=\"standfirst\" data-component=\"standfirst\">\n<h4>The more we know about what other people earn, the more we can understand our own circumstances<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"content__meta-container content__meta-container--tonal-header content__meta-container--twitter js-content-meta u-cf \">\nI was paid a $12,500 advance to write my book, Open Up. Sharing this publicly, even as the author of a book about our emotional relationship with money, was initially petrifying, but I ended up revealing it in the book \u2013 it\u2019s there on page 17. When I got the book deal, I\u2019d excitedly tell people and they\u2019d inevitably ask: \u201cDid you get an advance?\u201d And like most chats about money, the conversation would abruptly stop there.<br \/>\nI worried about telling people the amount for so many reasons. I thought it would compromise my publisher or my agent. I worried it would compromise the book, and that people would think: \u201cOh, that\u2019s not a large amount, it can\u2019t be very good.\u201d The only book deals we hear about are the six-figure ones, and they can be misleading; a headline-grabbing \u201c$100,000 four-book deal\u201d is really only $25,000 a book, and if a book takes a year to write, that pays the author a below-average salary.<br \/>\nWe\u2019re fascinated by what other people earn not only because we\u2019re nosey, but because the more we know about what other people earn, the more we understand our own circumstances. You can\u2019t tell if you\u2019re being under- or overpaid without knowing what other people in your industry earn. Since my book was published, two authors have been in touch to say: \u201cThanks for sharing your advance. I thought my publishers were low-balling me.\u201d<br \/>\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h4>Why read <span style=\"color: red;\">those books<\/span>?<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Mauris fringilla sem enim<\/li>\n<li>Nulla sit amet semper massa, ac volutpat turpis.<\/li>\n<li>Praesent venenatis ultricies erat.<\/li>\n<li>Nunc fringilla eros vitae nisl posuere, ut consectetur nulla<\/li>\n<li>Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation ullamcorper suscipit.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\nDiscussing personal finances is considered gauche, tacky or untoward. But we need to talk about money, and I mean our money: what we earn and what we spend. There are so many societal issues \u2013 the gender pay gap, the race pay gap, inequality, housing \u2013 that are impossible to solve collectively if we can\u2019t talk about money. If we\u2019re afraid to broach the subject of personal wealth, how can we challenge its inequalities?<br \/>\nI am fed up with navigating a culture that obsesses over who has what but discourages any conversation about our own finances, which was why I printed my advance. Others are starting to do the same, and not only through anonymous money diaries. Last week, blogger Alex Stedman behind the Frugality revealed that she pays herself an annual salary of $30,000. (\u201cI am 35 years old. I am the breadwinner. And I am the richest I have ever been,\u201d she wrote.) Earlier this month, podcaster Aminatou Sou divulged her 2018 salary in an interview with the Cut: more than $300,000 ($228,000), from a book deal along with \u201cpublic speaking, the podcast and sponsored \u2018influencer\u2019 stuff\u201d. Jessica Knoll recently set Twitter alight after revealing that income from her books have allowed her to buy a Porsche and pay for a $320-an-hour therapist. Knoll has an unapologetic attitude: \u201cI want to be rich and I\u2019m not sorry.\u201d But whether you share her ambitions or think her wealth is greedy, her honesty is helpful \u2013 we understand our own relationship with money better when we hear how other people feel about theirs.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Jessica Knoll recently set Twitter alight after revealing that income from writing has allowed her to buy her a Porsche<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>By talking about money more, maybe we\u2019ll shake off the shame. I don\u2019t want to encourage only people who have money to talk about it; we must all integrate money conversations into our daily lives. If you can endure the initial awkwardness and stop diverting the conversation the moment it gets to your personal finances, then maybe when a time comes when you need to stand up for yourself \u2013 challenge a pay gap at work, say, or simply tell a friend that, say, a $200 hen do is too expensive \u2013 you\u2019ll finally feel as if you can afford to.<br \/>\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"contributions__title\">We made a choice\u2026<\/h3>\n<p>\u2026 and we want to tell you about it. We made a choice which means our journalism now reaches record numbers around the world and more than a million people have supported our reporting. We continue to face financial challenges but, unlike many news organisations, we have chosen not to put up a paywall. We want our journalism to remain accessible to all, regardless of where they live or what they can afford.<br \/>\nReaders\u2019 support powers our work, safeguarding our essential editorial independence. This means the responsibility of protecting independent journalism is shared, enabling us all to feel empowered to bring about real change in the world. Your support gives Guardian journalists the time, space and freedom to report with tenacity and rigour, to shed light where others won\u2019t. It emboldens us to challenge authority and question the status quo. And by keeping all of our journalism free and open to all, we can foster inclusivity, diversity, make space for debate, inspire conversation \u2013 so more people have access to accurate information with integrity at its heart.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Original article by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/books\/booksblog\/2019\/mar\/28\/i-was-paid-12500-to-write-my-book-and-here-is-why-im-telling-you-alex-holder-personal-finance\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Guardian<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The more we know about what other people earn, the more we can understand our own circumstances I was paid a $12,500 advance to write my book, Open Up. Sharing this publicly, even as the author of a book about our emotional relationship with money, was initially petrifying, but I ended up revealing it in&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1874,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[20,28,36],"class_list":["post-367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-books","tag-income","tag-publication"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/books\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}